USA / France,
2002, 84 min
Shown in 2002
CREDITS
- dir
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Kirby Dick
- prod
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Amy Ziering Kofman
- cam
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Kirsten Johnson
- editor
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Kirby Dick, Matt Clarke
- mus
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Ryuichi Sakamoto
- source
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Zeitgeist Films, 247 Centre St., 2nd Floor, New York, NY 10013. FAX: 212-274-1644. EMAIL: web@zeitgeistfilm.com.
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COMMENTS
Kirby Dick, Amy Ziering Kofman and Jacques Derrida in person.
OTHER
Jacques Derrida is one of those rare individuals whose approach to the world is so profound and timely that his world-view alters the landscape of thought itself. Indeed, Derrida (much to his chagrin) is known as the “father of deconstruction.” The simultaneous publication of three of his major works in 1967 (Speech and Phenomena, Of Grammatology and Writing and Difference) helped provide inspiration for the May ’68 student/worker revolts in Paris, and ushered in the era we have come to know as Postmodern. In this spirit, filmmakers Kirby Dick and Amy Ziering Kofman embrace a deconstructionist ethos. They mix verité-like moments, formal interviews and excerpts from Derrida’s texts with a persistent inquiry into the nature of biography. Still, given this lofty intellectual setting, what is so surprising about Derrida, the film, is the ease with which viewers become familiar with Derrida, the person. Much more good-humored than you may have imagined, when asked, “If you were to see a documentary on Hegel, Kant or Heiddeger, what would you like to know?” Derrida replies, with the slightest grin, “Their sex lives.” In his answer, Derrida self-reflexively describes the film unspooling before us, as he playfully both offers and denies the most intimate aspects of his own life.
FACTOID #210
When Ginger Rogers appeared for a tribute at the SFIFF in 1984 (’sporting hair with the color and richness of whipped butter,’ wrote the Examiner), she shocked the packed Castro Theatre crowd at her 1984 tribute when she griped, ’The filthy mouths we’re hearing in films today’I won’t pay to see these movies. I’d rather stay home and make jam.’
